Change posture before the garbage is a matter of environmental education

The environmental impact caused by the improper disposal of waste on the environment results in negative and restrictive factors to urban development. They reduce the quality of life and have effects on health, economy and the own half.

The trash is considered a relatively recent problem, since a few decades ago was formed basically by organic materials, easily decomposed by nature. But with the change in consumer habits, the rise of industrial products and the advent of disposable packaging, trash has taken another dimension and its "composition" also changed. Today, instead of leftover food, the dumpsters overflow of plastic containers that carry an average of more than 100 years to decompose, not to mention other materials that have long life, such as glass, in the range of 4 thousand years.

The data vary somewhat between a source and another, but it is certain that Brazil produces about 100 thousand tons of garbage a day, however, recycles less than 5% of urban waste. Everything that is played daily in the trash, at least 35% could be reused or recycled, and other 35%, be turned into organic fertilizer.

The final destination of the trash is one of the aggravating environmental degradation. Separate collection allows the reduction of the amount of waste produced and the recycling of various materials, helping to preserve some elements of nature in the process of reclaiming processed materials.

It is important to note that the Brazilian solid waste Policy, regulated in August 2010, is based on criteria of definition of shared responsibility with the generators and indicates the need to reuse and recycling of solid waste, as well as the environmentally appropriate disposal of waste that cannot be reused or recycled.

It is considered that the problem is not exactly the characteristic of waste produced, today, in major urban centres, but fate has given him. Most of the materials that make up could be reused or recycled, thus diminishing the mountain formed in landfills or in landfills. Another important aspect of recycling, in addition to the ecological awareness, is the social factor. The collection of recyclable material is often the only source of income of the scavengers.

Selective waste collection programs started to be considered as an alternative source of income for the maintenance and survival of many families, in addition to contributing to sensitize the community to their effective participation in the implementation of selective waste collection, separating recyclable materials and/or directly in generating source reusable.

But, it is important to stress the importance of awareness-raising projects and environmental awareness, involving the whole of society and to bring the idea of recycling, by itself, cannot be considered a solution. It is imperative that the change of habits and attitudes of society, with actions that minimise the amount of waste on generating source itself, consuming less, reusing disposable packaging and discarding to the waste generated.